This is my first post to the landscape forum, I think. I'm a little nervous. (Ok, that was a lie. I'm a LOT nervous!)

I did a levels adj., curves, (luminosity only on both) crop, sharpen and reduced resolution and size. The color looks spot on, though. (Yes, they really are that orange.)

I am still having trouble understanding basic photoshop adj. layers (esp. Curves, Levels ) ... I suspect I might have gone too far here. But, I keep reading advice that I should not blow out the highlights on digital, so I metered on the water and badly underexposed the images. Levels was the only way to make them usable. In a way I kinda like the fairy-tale quality of the softness and reduced detail.

I posted other views for my buds over on the Sony forum, if any one wants to take a look. Any and all comments and critique would be GREATLY appreciated. I will have a chance in the morning to go out and re-shoot after I hear y'alls advice. Thanks in advance for your help. Ria

Very eye pleasing compositions and colour arrangement, RiaI'd certainly would like to walk down the placeyou've captured

Good thing you metered on the area which is likely to appear overexposed in the output. Still keep in mind that if that area does not have much significance in the composition, you can later use the burn tool in PS to healthat presumably overexposed area. Well it's not literally blown up then shadow/ highlight*tool in the PS will suffice. You can use the very tool* to bring light to the dark areas instead of the painful selecting and then trying sliders in the Levels process I think you can trythat tool in your first image, for example,and also some non aggressive USM (about%30).

Thank you so for taking the time to do the edits. They were much closer to the scene I actually saw through the camera. It is frustrating to me that I can see the picture I want, but I am not yet at the point where I can produce it in my camera.

Someday, maybe ... until then I'll keep practicing, and hope ya'll will keep up the excellent advice. It is very much appreciated. Ria

Thanks, Bahadir, for your kind and thoughtful comments. I am switching to a calibrated CRT monitor; when I get set up I am going to try out your advice straight away. I'm still having trouble with the whole not blowing the highlights concept --- when I follow it, my pictures usually come out too dark. I'll give the shadows/highlights tool another shot, and hopefully my next efforts will show some much needed exposure improvement.

Beautiful shots Ria! Great composition and not as bad as you think on the exposure. I have the same problem with exposure, as do most of us, I'm sure. I use http://helicon.com.ua/pages/to post process. You can pick and choose the parts of the photo you want to work on with the Retouch program and it's brush.